


Sleeping Lessons

by orphan_account



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Pre-Relationship, icky dream violence, tw blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-29
Updated: 2013-05-31
Packaged: 2017-12-13 07:28:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/821626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel has suffered one too many nightmares since falling and works up the courage to ask Dean if he could sleep in his room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wake Up

The diffuse light cast by the bedside lamp blankets Dean’s room as he prepares for sleep.  Now that they have a home base and beds free of questionable stains, he no longer sleeps fully dressed, instead clothed in a black cotton tee and boxers.  Peeling back the comforter, he sits and reaches toward the lamp’s chain pull but pauses upon hearing a gentle double knock on his bedroom door.

His face considers who it might be, brow furrowed and lips puckered slightly, and deciding it’s Sam there to tell him about his research, he pushes himself off the bed to ‘greet’ his brother with his impending eye-roll set to moderate.

“Sam, I swear if this is another thing about Scandinavian folklore, I’ll—” His sentence trails off at the sight of Cas, arms encircling a pillow anxiously, and eyes downcast to conceal their redness. 

“Cas, are you okay?”

The recently human man looks up through raw eyelids and hesitates to answer.

________________

 

_A blinding white light envelops him, his soul tearing at the thought of his Grace being consumed for the spell.  Never before has he needed to avert his eyes for any Heavenly brightness, let alone the presence of his own angelic self.  He’s deposited in a forest completely engulfed in darkness.  His suit and overcoat have been removed, and metal restraints burn his limbs.  Thin hooks wind their way to his eyes, and he finds he can no longer shut them to escape what’s coming.  What appear to be stars turn into screaming jets of Grace assaulting his bare skin, vats of molten steel pouring over his body.  Blood trails down his face as the hooks glide through his eyelids, destroying them, never to know darkness again._

________________

 

“Hey, man, talk to me,” Dean inclines his head to catch Cas’ teary, downturned gaze.  “No,” Castiel manages, vulnerable as an exposed nerve, “I’m not okay.  I have…nightmares…”

“Are you only here to tell me you have nightmares, Cas?” Dean prompts.

The ex-angel’s slumped form exudes embarrassment/shame/fear of rejection.

“I thought I might sleep more soundly if I had someone with me.  I knew what you’d think if I asked, but I had to try.” He looks up at the last part, jaw set.

________________

 

 _Lurid wisps of yellow smoke fill the air, emanating from the fire in Sam’s bedroom.  Dean rips the door open despite the searing doorknob._ This time _he’ll save mom.  But when he lunges into the room, he finds himself falling into an expansive pit.  The landing is rough, and he soon discovers why:  The floor is strewn with bodies in varying states of decay.  Sam, Bobby, his mother, Lisa, Cas, Jo, Ellen.  His entire family laying there, cold, rotting.  Because of him.  His fault.  Always his fault._

_He tries to run from the mass grave, but as he runs, the ground begins to bubble.  Blood seeps up and fills the grave above Dean’s head, filling his lungs, choking him, drowning him.  Good riddance._

________________

 

Dean nods his head slightly, answers, “Yeah, come in,” and walks back into his bedroom, leaving the door open.  


	2. Needles in My Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Cas are tired of Dean's bullshit.

“Hey, I’m going to that bar a few miles up the road.  Don’t know if I’ll be back tonight.” Dean winks lewdly.  “Dean, are you sure you’re fine?  You haven’t had this much action since…wow, now that I think about it, it’s been _years._ ” Sam’s eyebrows bob in astonishment.  “Since when did banging chicks have anything to do with me being ‘fine?’  Listen, I’m good as I’ve ever been.  I’ll be back tomorrow; I promise.”  Despite his reassuring tone, Sam still holds doubts about Dean’s emotional state.  You just don’t jump from a dry year to one-night stands during every case.

“Okay, see you later.” He nods as his brother exits their motel room.

 ______________ 

_‘Damn, he’s getting suspicious._ ’  Dean lets out a nervous breath once he’s shut the door and sets off, not toward the Impala, but five rooms away to Castiel’s room.  He opens the already unlocked door and tosses his coat on the back of the nearest chair.  Castiel stands in front of the small bathroom’s mirror, brushing vigorously and intermittently spitting toothpaste into the sink.

Dean grabs Cas’ duffle and roots around in it until he finds his nightclothes.  Tossing them on the bed and rubbing his hands together, he finally speaks to Cas.  “I don’t know exactly what Sam is thinking, but he knows I’m hiding something.”  The other hunter wipes his mouth with a towel and replies while finding his way to his side of the bed.  “Well, you could always tell him that you’re sleeping in my room.”  Cas quirks his eyebrow, awaiting the inevitable response. 

“The whole purpose of me telling him I’m going out is to avoid what I’m really doing.”  He bristles, unsure of how Cas could be so clueless, and storms into the bathroom to change and avoid the conversation.

“You should’ve told him in the first place, Dean.  Sam is very sensitive to your actions, and there wasn’t a way you could do this secretly without arousing suspicion.” Cas flicks on the bedside lamp when Dean returns and turns off the overhead light; he settles into the queen-sized bed and punches the pillow, partly in frustration but more so in an attempt to make the stiff material more comfortable.

“There’s no way I’m telling him about this.  If I do, it’ll only lead to a conversation I want no part of.”

“What conversation would that be?” Cas’ ears perk, interest noticeably piqued.

Dean’s cheeks redden, and he tries to be calm but his following explanation sounds a little too defensive.  “Nothing.  Just touchy-feely crap.” 

Castiel squints in thought and extinguishes the remaining light, deciding that’s all he’ll get out of his stubborn friend for now.

They settle in, and a pregnant silence lies between the two.

“Thank you for this, Dean.”  The ex-angel finally decides to say.

“No problem.” 

And the two slip into a relatively peaceful sleep.

______________

Sam opens the motel door around 1 am to discover the Impala parked right where Dean had left it that evening.  If Dean wasn’t at the bar, it wasn’t hard to guess where he might be.  Sam sighs and crawls into bed. ‘ _My emotionally-stunted, idiot brother.’_ He groans, rubs his eyes, and falls asleep.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Working on the third part as we speak.


	3. These Arms of Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam knows that Cas is in love with Dean, but doesn't even touch on Dean's feelings because, haha, oh my god, that would be a shitstorm. Then Dean goes to Cas' room, and things blow up from there.

Dean grabs his coat and keys from the table, heading toward the motel door.  “I’m going out tonight.”

“This is a dry county, Dean. That means no bars for at least thirty miles.”

“Then I’ll drive thirty miles. Geez, it’s no problem.”

Sam rolls his head and puts a stop to his brother’s lying.  “I know that you’re sleeping in Cas’ room, alright.”

Dean is quick to defend himself; he raises a hand in his brother's direction ready to explain.  “Look it’s not what you think.  He has nightmares and needed someone to help calm him down.”

“And why do you think he asked you and not me?”

Dean snorts, “You would take up most of the bed? Hell, I don’t know.”

“Have you considered how he feels about you?”

“No, we are _not_ going there.”  His body language instantly turns defensive.

“Okay then,”  Sam considers another way of approaching the topic, “I’ll stop if you can tell me why Cas used to watch you sleep.”

“First of all, _how the hell do you know about that?_   Second, I don’t see how that relates to whether or not Cas is in love with me.  Come on, the guy was gonna shut the gates of Heaven and lock the doors behind him.  I’m not very high on his list.”  Dean gathers his luggage, and Sam is stunned and disheartened upon hearing what Dean thinks.  “Look, now that you know about this little arrangement, I’ll just take my bags with me. ‘Night, Sam.”

“’Night, Dean.” Sam forces a sad smile that comes out in more of a wince.

___________________

 

The door opens with a disgruntled Dean carrying his belongings.

Cas sits down at the circular table positioned near the kitchenette. “I take it Sam found out.”  
“Yeah, and he doesn’t know what he's talking about.” Dean deposits the bags beside the other chair and remains standing.

“What exactly did he say?”  Cas doubts Dean's judgment of the situation. ‘ _If he doesn’t want to see something, he won’t_.’

“It doesn’t matter.”  As Dean turns away from the bag he was unpacking, he is met with an exasperated Castiel.  “Then why did it make you so angry?”

“He thought he knew why you went to my door instead of his that night.”

Cas thinks over his answer carefully.  “Although Sam would understand my problem, I wouldn’t have been comfortable going to him about it.”

Dean considers this triumphantly, but his pride is short-lived.

“What did Sam think was the answer?”  There were only so many ways Dean could avoid the question, so he wasn’t stopping until he answered clearly.

“Dammit, Cas, it doesn’t matter because it’s not true!”  Cas rises, growing in bristling frustration.  “What isn’t true?” His voice now a pointed growl.

“That _you’re in love with me!_ ” His temper flares momentarily and dims into an unguarded wistfulness, shaking his head, closing his eyes, and walking away toward the bathroom in defense.  “Why is that so out of the question?” Cas stays planted until the other hunter turns around.  Dean stops dead, considers the other with narrowed eyes, and leers.  “If you love someone, do you disappear on them every chance you get?  Do you decide to close the Gates of friggin’ Heaven without telling them?  We’ve been friends for nearly six years, and you didn’t even think about what leaving would do to me!”

“Dean, I had to try to fix what I’d destroyed.  My brothers needed me,” he says as if Dean should understand his duty to put his family back together.

“So, what, am I not part of your family anymore? “

“I didn’t say that.” He recoils, Dean’s question kicking him in the stomach.

“Then tell me, Cas, if I’m family, how could you even begin to choose locking yourself in Heaven?”

“Because I can handle piecing Heaven back together, but I can’t handle disappointing you.  You deserve happiness, and that seems impossible with me still here because all I do is cause you pain.”  Each word is the ex-angel splitting himself open a little wider, bleeding until he’s light-headed.

“Cas…” Dean crosses the room to his friend’s dejected form, “I couldn’t stand it if you left for good, man.  What part of ‘I need you’ don't you get?”  He pulls Cas into a hug, rocking back and forth.  He smiles into the side of the other hunter’s hair as Cas returns the gesture, arms hesitant at first but then just as powerful.

“What Sam thought was true,” Dean barely hears the whispered admission and pulls away to look at Cas when the words finally register.  Each studies the other’s face until Dean responds with a grin.

“Good.”

And that’s the last word either speaks before they re-close the distance between their bodies, feeling the skin of each other’s lips for the first and definitely not the last time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this lacks a lot of description. I found it gets repetitive in a dialogue heavy, action-lacking fics. And no cuddles! Sorry for that, too. I felt that it resolved well the way it did after their huge fight that would never happen on the show because of time constraints. >.>  
> And I hope you guys noticed the Sam and Cas parallels about disappointing Dean!


End file.
